Objects Of His Obsession (8 page)

Yet the comment cut him. Was it
supposed to? Make him feel foolishly provincial, overcautious?

He had to believe so.

Turning his attention from
Evander he dressed, Evander having clearly dismissed him for the evening, blue
gaze focused on the crumbling embers in the fireplace once more.

Benedict gathered his scattered
clothes from the floor, the chair, dressed in the shadows outside the immediate
glow of those embers. He couldn’t sense Evander’s gaze on him. Didn’t feel it
at all. If it weren’t for the powerful personality of the man filling the room
he wouldn’t have known he was not alone.

Clothed, shirt buttoned and
jacket smoothed, he paused with his hand on the door. His eyes sought out the
sprawled, indolent figure on the bed.

Every muscle of that long, lean
frame, every line of that beautiful face was utterly self-contained. The
cleanly cut, sharply intelligent profile turned to Evander’s study of the fire.

Benedict’s lips parted to
speak. But the ice suddenly emanating from the man who had so thoroughly
possessed his body stilled the words.

No, Evander wasn’t interested
in conversation. Wasn’t interested in him.

In fact, he’d already been cut
out of the picture.

The house was massive, the rugs
soft underfoot over polished wood, stifling the sound of his footsteps as he
found his way through the maze of corridors. With every step the certainty grew
in him.

Five more nights.

Five more nights here. Four
more nights than the other guests. Didn’t matter that he was here, in theory,
to study the Casterwell collection of Egyptian artifacts. Revise the outdated inventories
and gain a quick overview. Advise of their best use. Possible museums they
might eventually be gifted to. Work that he’d planned to begin today, his
social obligations with the other guests as he saw it, filled.

With Evander’s scent on his
skin, his body still pleasurably weary, arsehole still pleasurably throbbing
from Evander’s thorough possession, that incredible initiation, he could not
stay here any longer than he had to.

Gutless, yes, but enough was
enough. Better to get out now before he made more of a fool of himself than he
had already.

He would advise on a colleague
who could work on the collection. There were several who were competent enough
and would leap at the task.

But Sweet Jesus, he
was
being gutless. Or making the only
sane choice, depending on which way he viewed it.

Back in his room he packed his
trunk quickly. No need to wait till dawn and call for a maid to complete the
task. He was quite used to looking after himself.

Packing done, he paced around
the well-appointed room that he had been given. It was more luxurious than his
base in London, a narrow, outdated Georgian terrace house, his one possession
of true value. It was also claustrophobic.

One last look at that
incredible, famed collection of artifacts.

It would kill time till dawn.

One last look to distract him,
before he got transport to the small railway station he had arrived by, and
left.

~~***~~

He was halfway there, by his
calculation, his inner sense of direction working well, when he rounded a
corridor and bumped straight into a soft female body.

“Hell,” he bit out softly.

Standing back, he glanced down
and caught his breath.

In the dim light he caught a
glimpse of unbound, golden hair tumbling around white-clad shoulders.

“Benedict?”

Juliana St John tilted her
chin, massive eyes fixing on his face as he steadied them both with a quick,
impersonal hand on her arm. He dropped that hand just as rapidly.

“Juliana,” he nodded, curt. Gut
twisting.

My wife spends her nights with
her lover, Evander had remarked easily, the night before. She returns to her
rooms before dawn.

Apparently that had been the
pure, unalloyed truth.

He made to continue on his way.
The etiquette of the situation didn’t exactly call for further conversation.

To his shock Evander’s
exquisite, deceptively angelic, wife caught hold of his arm and stopped him.

Her eyes glimmered in the dim
as they moved over him. Took in his appearance.

He was fully dressed and ready
to leave at first light. Tie neatly in place, the gold links of his pocket
watch glinted against his dark waistcoat, a well tailored, lightweight jacket
snug over his shoulders. White shirt glowing in the poorly lit corridor.

Juliana raised a finely arched
blonde brow. Without further preamble, she caught at his elbow, yanked open the
door closest to them, and shoved him inside.

“You have not struck me as an
insomniac, Benedict,” she said thoughtfully. “Nor one so eager for breakfast
that he dresses for it hours ahead of time. Tell me, just what were you
planning?”

Benedict was still in shock,
blinking in the bright overhead gaslight. Juliana had brought them both into
what was clearly an unused guest bedroom, smaller and simpler than his own.

“Juliana–” he began.

She held up a hand, cupids bow
of her rose lips compressed as she glanced over him, hazy blue eyes shrewd.

Astonishing that she could be
so commanding, considering that she was dressed in nothing more than a pale
cashmere dressing gown over her nightclothes.

Benedict reminded himself once
again that Evander had stated quite clearly and with total acceptance, that his
wife had a lover. Her state of dress only confirmed it. He himself might not
know exactly who Juliana St John had spent the last hours with, but that
knowledge made being faced with the wife of the man he had just fucked no more
comfortable.

“I have pressing matters back
in London,” he said quickly and with more self-possession that he felt. “Truly,
I should not have accepted this weekend’s invitation. I have many notes to
write up, little time to do it in, and all of my books and papers are back in
my home.”

“Is that so?”

Juliana regarded him steadily.
Her soft blue eyes were enigmatic.

It had never occurred to
Benedict before just how alike husband and wife were.

Both were strikingly beautiful,
yes, but they were
alike
. Something
under the skin, some quality of being unreadable, slightly detached even in the
midst of others. Some quality of watchfulness. Of things hidden.

It was disquieting.

“Yes,” Benedict said briskly.
“I was going to ask if I could be taken to the station once the servants were
about. I’m sure one of your men could take me over there in the trap. It’s not
a long trip.”

“I am aware of that,” Juliana
returned dryly.

Benedict cleared his throat.
His starched collar felt damned uncomfortable against his skin. Egypt. He’d
grown too used to a rather more casual manner of dress.

He heartily wished he were back
there now.

“Yes. The last few days have
been … have been most enjoyable, but I am neglecting my responsibilities and
must go.”

“You cannot leave.”

Benedict’s brows jerked
together.

“You said you would stay, that
you would examine that endless collection my husband’s grandfather amassed.
Evander has been thinking for some time of donating a most generous portion of
that collection to some worthy institution. You knew that when you gave your
assurances that you would advise him. You cannot leave until you have done so.
We are depending on you. To not stay another few days and do as you have
promised would be most unkind of you, Benedict.”

He was horrified. “But there
are many other–”

“Experts who could offer their
advice? Most certainly. But you were the one invited here to give that advice,
you accepted, and you are here now.”

She had him neatly trapped by
his own good manners and knew it.

The woman was pure steel. He
had been correct in his reading of her.

She and her husband
were
alike. Indomitable will under
stunning beauty. That steely will masked by it.

“I should go,” he insisted
grittily.

That pink cupids bow of a mouth
curled up and abruptly, the grim determination in her eyes disappeared. Briefly
her hand touched his arm with a familiarity that somehow shocked him, even
after the events of the last ten minutes. The massive diamond on her ring
finger glinted. Flashed fire.

“But you won’t go, will you,
Benedict?” The wide blue eyes were guileless as they moved over his
clean-shaven, sun browned face. “We would all miss you terribly. You have been
such good company, and both Evander and I are looking forward to hearing of any
plans you suggest for the collection.”

Muscle clenched in his jaw. He
shook his head, his overly long hair falling into his eyes. Impatiently he
brushed it back. “Please, I assure you, I am most sorry to cause–”

“So formal, and we have moved
well past that. But you will stay, Benedict.” She smiled again. “I can see why
my husband asked you here. You really are special. It must be your obsession
with your work. I can always tell those marked by obsession. I truly pity those
who live without it. I adore obsessions, don’t you? They really are the only
things worth living for.”

The day passed in a haze.
Juliana St John had perhaps been correct in her steely reminder of his true
purpose here. The Casterwell Egyptian antiquities collection.

In the light of day, seated at
the breakfast table, the others feasting on kedgeree, porridge, scrambled eggs,
mountains of bacon, kidneys, Benedict ate a freshly baked roll and drank
coffee, forcing himself to smile at the banter about the table.

They were a good crowd. As
before, he mused on what an interesting group of individuals the Casterwell’s
had ranged about them. Their class clearly of less interest than their
characters and endeavors.

Evander, seated at the head of
the table, Juliana beside him, somehow looked as if he’d had a full nights
sleep. As did his wife.

Benedict could not fathom it,
and yet, whatever arrangement they had come to within their marriage, they
looked as if they were in perfect accord. Truly, the visceral shock of that
astonishing twinned beauty now fading with time, it became even more apparent
just how well matched they were.

Not that there were overtly
affectionate gestures between them. It was in the small moments.

Evander turning, briefly
placing his hand over hers as he murmured something in her ear. Her sudden
smile. The way she’d absently brushed back a speck of lint from his lapel as
they’d stood, chatting by the window before taking their seats.

As she’d done so, Evander had
suddenly glanced across the room and blandly eyed him.

They’d moved over to the table
and as he drew back first his wife’s and then his chair, seating himself,
Evander gave him a smile of polite enquiry. “Sleep well, Yeats? Or were you
still reliving yesterday’s victory?”

It was only at the brief burst
of clapping, comments about the table that Benedict realized his host was
referring to the archery match between them. The loss of Nautilus Prime in that
mad wager.

Not the loss of a certain
virginity to the man.

“I slept like a log,” he
managed, and then added flatly, “Although you are right. I should not have.”

“You cannot be a gambling man,
then,” Evander said blandly, “Or you would understand Checkers’ air of victory
right now.”

Benedict muttered some reply
and Evander nodded, turning his attention to the horse trainer. The gentleman
now the owner of Nautilus – or main shareholder, Benedict recalled
abruptly, having forgotten about his own ten percent, negotiated by Juliana, and
gave him a few pointers as to the colt’s progress since his purchase.

Evander’s brief, dismissive
turquoise glance should have been disarming.

Instead it was nothing. Because
it was clear that to him that Benedict had lost his attention. Simply become
the Egyptologist here to examine his grandfather’s collection.

And that hurt, and yet…

Yet it should have been a
relief.

As it was, he took it as a
hint.

And as a means of escape from
the situation, as much of a coward as that may have made him.

And so after breakfast he’d
taken his small kit, the clothbound, yellowing original inventories of the
collection, and his own notebooks up with him to the galleries housing the
pieces. He’d expected one of the servants to show him up there.

Instead it had been the lady of
the house.

Juliana had handed him a bundle
of numbered keys on a ring.

“For the glass cases,” she’d
explained, preceding him into the first of the galleries. She’d glanced about
herself, blue eyes filled with pleasure. Her smile had been wry as she’d
watched him carefully set down his small bundle of objects. “I love this place.
I remember being fascinated by it, even as a child.” She pointed across the
room, to the magnificent black and gold sculpture of Anubis, the jackal headed god.
“I adored Anubis. I think because I just loved dogs so much.”